Premeds are often curious about med school rankings, wanting to know how various schools stack up. The list used most frequently is issued annually by US News and World Report, which sorts schools into two categories, primary care and research. There is another ranking of medical schools worldwide done by Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China. The medical schools that straddle both lists (although not necessarily in the top 10 on each) are listed alphabetically here:
1. Columbia
2. Harvard
3. Johns Hopkins
4. Stanford
5. UCLA
6. UCSF
7. University of Michigan
8. University of Pittsburgh
9. University of Washington
10. University of Texas Southwestern
For those who pay attention to rankings, be sure to know the methodology used. Perhaps the criteria aren’t relevant to your goals or important in what you seek in a medical school. A thoughtful article was recently written in the Atlantic regarding what to look for in a med school and the elements that distinguish one school from another.
–Liza Thompson, Expert Medical School Admissions Consulting